CASEY TAKES HEART IN HER HERITAGE
SINGER Casey Donovan is one of Australia’s queens of the big gig, owning every stage she takes.
Yet it is only in the last few years the 34-year-old star of musical hits Chicago and 9 to 5 has felt unafraid to use her powerful voice to celebrate her Indigenous heritage.
As the proud Gumbaynggirr/Dunghutti woman joins a stellar cast for
From the Heart of Our Nation, A Celebration to mark NITV’s 10th anniversary as a free-to-air channel on Monday, the bi-racial singer says she has always wrestled with the fear of being thought of as an impostor.
Her parents were separated when she was two and she didn’t have the opportunity to learn about father Merv Donovan’s family. When she was thrust into the public eye at 16 as the winner of Australian Idol, she struggled to answer questions about her Aboriginal heritage.
“I’ve always been proud of that heritage of mine (but) for a very long time ... I felt like that didn’t belong to me,” she said. “I wasn’t privileged to have that upbringing of knowing that community and that side of my family, and that was very heartbreaking and very hard because I felt like an impostor.”
She said being on the SBS series Who Do You Think You
Are in 2019 helped her connect with her Indigenous roots and “heal” her fears.
“That was a massive light bulb moment for me, that I can stand up and tell my truth and no one can take that away from me,” said Donovan, who will share the From The Heart Of Our Nation concert stage with “trailblazers” such as Troy Cassar-Daley and Christine Anu.